six of the c.r.p. interviewers intriguing stories are you. still trying. to find out because it. has twenty thirteen spreads across the world we will show you the most spectacular celebrations and look ahead to the potential challenges the faces in the new year. we also look back on a year filled with conflict and cut protests and unrest and hear from our correspondents about how it could have been different. plus it is a fiscal cliff a last minute deal looks set to fend off a new year tax hike in america for the time being at least and island takes over as the head of the european union but its massive debt leaves it in a weak position just as the broad calls out for strong leadership.

and i welcome and happy new year you are watching r.t. life from moscow with me. now is a new year continues to roll out across the world let's take a quick look at some of the most spectacular celebrations that have happened so far new zealand was among the first to usher in twenty thirty crowd packed the harbor in oakland to enjoy the display of the city's sky tower while almost two million people turned out at the key celebration in this trailer city skyline erupting with the now standard jaw dropping fireworks at midnight from harbor bridge great site a midnight later moved on to asia this is hong kong which really built up the tension with a camp dam then lit up the sky from both land and sea. shortly

after europe welcomed the new year with a major fireworks display at the brandenburg gate in berlin becoming one of the world's largest open air parties and it doesn't display also splash skies above the london eye in the u.k. capital crossed the atlantic over a million spectators descended on new york's iconic times square to celebrate the event with the provisional ball drop. and a kiss or two while the new year in russia officially kicked off when the clock on space guy tower in moscow rang out twelve times red square was filled with crowds as fireworks lit the skies above the kremlin russians it's been a year of major political challenges and the rise of vocal public opinion parties peter lavelle has taken a fine tooth comb to russian politics over the years and my colleague kevin erin and initial now you asked how he sees things panning out. so what is the future of russia's political opposition as you see the new compared to two thousand and

twelve i would say it's kind of bleak but not hopeless ok we didn't come up with any new ideas new organization new faces in the pussy riot is that we are of the opposition that's pretty dreadful situation for the russian people and political development in general here and there's there was political change in this country in a positive change to make up the opposition as we head into the it's a very interesting question because i have gone to most of the major demonstrations and there were people there of goodwill in my opinion but then there were fascists there ok and they were communists there and they were these are people that they are ok and if you are right to demonstrate i was all for it actually i like to hear it but they didn't accomplish anything but i could see they have no organization no unifying ideas except for i don't like but amir putin is not a very it's not a political agenda there were a few protesters i was out as well where it did seem like that was the method if you wanted to gain traction on this opposition movement do you see people coming out and take the train lost

a lot of its novelty effect right now ok because political change takes years in years in years that have to be local this is what happens in political changes with countries that were what they were tearing at one time it takes a long time to get people involved in the process and that is happening very very strongly there are some people that want to really fast and they don't want to do it through elections they want power because they want power because they believe they deserve it and what about the fact that we're not going to see any presidential elections of course that all led up to being elected a third term this protest and now they're kind of when i'm down now what i would say to people i mean if you want to continue to protest in but you know join a political party there are forty four of them now you have a choice ok get involved see one of the things i saw with a lot of the protesters is that they want someone else to do all the hard work ok they want to go out and wave a flag. give out a slogan we don't want to do the hard nitty gritty work of political change and that's what we need to do i would be looking at the next parliamentary election

project will know we certainly will be in pure movement as you come up as one of the great programs in store will wish you all the very person you cross talk to all about the new year and all to thank you. well twenty thirty will be a year of change for iran as the current president steps down with no clear successor in sight later in the program we'll look if the upcoming election will take foreign eyes of iran's nuclear program though on the way the last years have seen a fierce struggle and death for many in syria and some feel twenty thirteen will fail to bring long awaited the war towards day. america breathes a sigh of relief going into the new year as lawmakers in washington strike a temporary deal on the gauge of the fiscal cliff the senate has already agreed to hold the proposed tax hike which was set to affect virtually every u.s. worker but it's not all good news the deal still has to go before the house of representatives later in the day and be thrashed out fully in

a few months time. nobody is talking about the true issue to the fact that the country and the western world is bankrupt basically this is a classic case of kicking the can down the road they didn't want to address it before the election so they said we'll extend the debt and we'll just wait till next year and they thought it would go up quite a bit further but the deficit ran up so much faster than anticipated will take care of it tomorrow and that's all the politicians in the us or anywhere to they're not proactive they're not problem solvers they don't care about you and all they care about is their own little power and you know let the rest of the world be damped american doesn't understand why his country by the world economy is going down the drain all they know is class warfare which is what. the administration wants that the banks are getting rich and they're getting poorer they don't understand

why any of this is happening so for the average american they're going to pay some more taxes the average americans in fear of losing his job and losing everything that he's worked this whole life for and he doesn't have a clue why. how the financial. the fiscal cliff is just more of fear from bankers and politicians trying to distract people from the underlying root. that is a bunch of. bankers who are manipulating the system. destroying the economy the first go cliff is just more grow more theater it doesn't really focus on the true on the line we're going to see more of this going to about thirty things like the mob with the rich more and their torches are coming after these people they want to just delay that reckoning for many months but they regulate reporting.

well squeeze tight and not too happy about it the e.u. is also celebrating new year at our home we look back on the life just twenty twelve for the union and hear what the coming year may have in store for europe that's what our website. to america's main political event of the year the presidential election a thrilling race with the run is neck and neck all the way to the finish that's what it looked like with obama snatching victory from mitt romney at the very last moment their competition overshadowed some third party candidates who were left struggling to get their voice heard. reflects on the race to the top. there were cheers of relief here when he won i would say because the alternative was thought to be so much worse many voted out of fear that romney could win for them he was another george w. bush so whether americans have fallen out of love with obama the two thousand and

eight euphoria was gone that's for sure back then there were these crowds you know in the streets all across the country shedding tears of joy so bad in their view where the eight years of bush presidency obama was revealed as the savior and then he went to save the banks save the auto industry something he took a special pride in during the election campaign but across the country millions of people remained out of work and are still out of work so this time president obama ran under the banner it could have been so much worse as you imagine it was not a banner for national euphoria it was more like you have no choice but to choose me kind of better something that shocked me while i was covering the election here it was it was the second debate between obama and romney i'm sure you remember you remember that as a presidential nominee from the green party jule styne was arrested right outside the venue where the debate was taking place she was protesting for exclusion from

the debate and nobody like no news channel kiran mentioned her arrest none and i was switching channels for hours to see if anything was said about that and it was nothing i can imagine what the reaction would be here in the states if a presidential candidate is the other big country was arrested in the media there wouldn't even mention it but apparently it happens in the u.s. no big deal presidential candidates get arrested all the time right well there was some irony in that yes anyway during the election campaign the mainstream media had been focused on nothing else and no one else but these two candidates and we are t.v. as you remember of course saw the saw an opportunity there to show what others don't and we hosted the debate. well there was one event that shook the u.s. so badly that it made president obama put the country's tragedy second amendment under some heavy fire the sandy hook primary school shooting that left twenty children and six stuff that saw the president for a ban on some firearms tom hartman looks at whether the new year might bring some

change in america's weapons policy my guess is what we're going to see is a cosmetic change we're going to see probably the or the assault weapons ban come back they'll be a fair number of loopholes in it but you know the u.s. is not going to end up going the way that's what's a longer israel of daughter many most european countries have done australia when john howard was president one thousand nine hundred eight when there was a mass slaughter and then they said ok that's it we're going to buy back all the guns and it's not going to happen here there's just too much money being made with guns insane supreme court or at least five right wing crazies out of nine on the supreme court decided that even though the second amendment says in order to maintain a well regulated militia necessary for the for the security of a free state the right to you know you people have the right to own guns that's half of it the other half of it is that the supreme court also said that corporations interest groups lobbying groups billionaires can throw unlimited

amounts of money at politicians freedom of speech but not the spica we were pulled on the world's most wanted whistleblower. and what he managed to achieve while staying on the house arrest and in hiding that's coming up in a few things. speak your language. programs and documentaries in arabic it's all here on. reporting from the world talks about six of the ip interviews intriguing story for you to. try. to

find out more visit our big. dog called. welcome back who was uprisings crises worldwide protest night twenty twelve a turbulent year with not that much positive news but what if it had turned differently and kept it off now explores the headlines that could have begun. twenty twelve was certainly full of disappointing headlines hope fueled by the arab

spring turned into the turmoil of the arab autumn the war in syria claimed countless lives and the fiscal crisis all the european union torn apart at its very seams and the problems facing our world today certainly don't offer themselves up to an easy fix what if things had turned out differently what if opportunities were actually the pawn instead of missed well here's our look at the twenty twelve headlines that could have been. diplomacy succeeds in syria ending bloody conflict. instead this was the image of syria the world saw increasingly violent clashes between government forces and the opposition had claimed more than forty thousand lives efforts to negotiate a diplomatic solution fell flat as divisions ripped apart both the country and the international community hundreds of thousands of refugees have fled to neighboring states where many have found conditions to be dismal meanwhile syria's war is

threatening to spill over its borders as tensions escalate within and in the region . has told me to try and sanction slashed. to accept. running to end gun fire the u.s. remains to restrict foreign. mideast peace to israel league two state who promised on. yet this was their reality israel's assault on palestinian militants in gaza israel's anti-missile shield repelled the most attacks on its territory but a strike claimed the lives of more than one hundred sixty palestinians many of them civilians just plain harsh condemnation from many in the international community the war and israel's subsequent decision to construct three thousand new settlements effectively slammed the door shut to any prospect of peace ghost people power moment is. step aside and let democracy. get lost get most notorious kuantan

in my prison permanently shot. euro zone cuts the cuts and lifts austerity. but the news of austerity only tightened as deep public sector cuts brought thousands of angry demonstrators to the streets of greece spain italy and portugal . the worst economic crisis of a generation has battered the european union's very foundations exacerbating tensions between member states with some regions now desperately wanting out i grew up in a europe that was divided from east to west living in a europe that is divided from old to self never at any point in the history of this union has there been more discord of rank that we covered. corporate cash banned from the campaign coffers as part of the us political cleanup. now we hear for u.k. british quit european union. we can expound a duty on the solyndra point to un free speech and. instead a song remains

a political refugee at ecuador's london embassy where he's been granted asylum he continues to fight extradition to sweden over alleged sex crimes charges that he says are politically motivated and tied to his work in leaking international government secrets. the power of people speaking up and resisting together terrifies corrupt democratic power so much so that ordinary people here in the west and the enemy of governments an enemy to be watched and enemy to be can for all and to be impoverished true democracy is not the white house true democracy is not camera true democracy is the resistance of people with the truth against flies from top to right here in london. everyday ordinary people teach us that democracy is free speech and dissent.

from heretics to hero american whistleblower bradley manning finally free. droning on memo nations agree to end iraq of remote controlled war. egypt's arab spring sees democracy defeat hardline islam as. the reality on the ground was anything but egyptian president mohamed morsi is fouled like power grab unleashed fury and frenzied street battles and a fast track to constitutional overhaul referendum left a bitter opposition eager for change for them two thousand and twelve saw the arab spring transformed into an egyptian nightmare had the revolution to get rid of a tyrant dictator. in the order to that we made elections the revolution and elections to choose someone to the present us turned out that this guy is also a tyrant but these headlines may have been the stuff of imagination but that sea of twenty thirteen can bring any of them to life with the coffin of r.t.

moscow syria has reportedly opened the new year with a horrifying discovery of dozens of corpses in the capital damascus some of the bodies were decapitated and bore traces of torture they have not yet been identified this comes amid widespread there will be any major breakthrough in syria's bloody civil standoff anytime say. very sad to say to everybody all over the world that the top geopolitical tragedy of two thousand and thirteen is going to be the top geopolitical tragedy of two thousand and eleven the rape of syria the only possibility would be that the opposition. in a syrian way this sides not to listen to the saudis the turks their qataris the americans the brits and the french and they sit down with the assad government and they will work out a transitional government or at least

a transitional period leading to free and fair elections is this going to happen not likely there's been no love lost between palestinians and israelis in the aftermath of yet another war between the two today television plans new settlements in occupied palestinian land while hamas and fattah. and promise no quarter. reports on what it bodes for the future. if you look at what's happening on the ground israel continues to announce settlement construction and the palestinians continue to say that for as long as these announcements continue they will be no resumption of peace talks it wasn't so long ago that the palestinians were going to stay to the right information that you cannot detect the fact that we still have palestinian faction groups hamas and fatah who always seem to be at each other's throats in less than a month the israelis will go to the polls and by all predictions they will really lead the israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu for another term of office and it doesn't seem as if he has an olive branch so certainly the prognosis for any

kind of peace moves is far back in two thousand and eight two thousand and nine we had a conflict that was twenty two days long by comparison this hung around with eight days four years ago the casualty count was more than a thousand people who were killed most of the palestinians this time around the casualty count was was a lot lower and again four years ago there was a ground offensive this time around there wasn't a ground operation. in june twenty third seen around will be holding a presidential election. won't be running having served the maximum two terms and aside from that there's no certainty as to who will take over at a tense time when iran's nuclear program continues to be a thorn in some western nations sides journalist tense e.u. has often shared his thoughts with us doesn't think the new leader will bend to foreign will. i think. people of iran elect policy foreign policy terms things are going to be much the same terminology of

western corporate media or a bizarre image of the islamic extremists of all sorts of different morning because the point is iran is there to stay in terms of forging a very different type of developing nation economy because it has all that oil and has all those resources and it's not going to suddenly start changing things the way the i.m.f. or the way washington wants it to be. u.s. war on terror sometimes goes just too far a british olympic hero is held by american customs on suspicion he's a terrorist or that just because he happened to be born in the wrong country. but that r.t. dot com plus the latest from movie skyfall goes into history as it reaches a staggering one billion dollars box office mark for the first time in a franchise history all this at our web site. in

europe people are making their you wishes and plenty of them have their fingers crossed that things will be a little less tight in twenty thirteen but investment advisor patrick young says greece still doesn't have a functioning government system that will be able to pull the country out from the deep recession it now faces. what's happened so far has been so when engine cuts on the masses and we really haven't managed to make the remotest impact upon the whole nation itself greece is still fundamentally in a huge problematic situation it does not remotely have a functioning government system that fiscally is going to manage to organize itself in any which way possible to manage to get through the continuing swen cuts that need to take list and of course then we're looking at the whole issue of the demonstrators are the governments listening well the truth is the governments can't afford to listen because what we're seeing within the european union even if the

euro has survived miraculously for twelve months government has run out of money the european union's western socialist model of spending huge amounts of money borrowing even greater amounts of money and hoping to pay everything manyara or indeed thirty years from manion or simply does not work. well only three years ago island was bankrupt i'm receiving a bailout to rescue it's failed economy but despite this the very same country has just taken the six month presidency of the european council and as artie's or smith reports the celtic tiger has some hard graft ahead. it's all changed by the e.u. presidency as takes over this six month rotating challenge on the first of january not the ovi is choice islands one of the guys in peg's the countries that have the least stable economies in europe and sure enough arlen's the first country to take

hold in the presidency of the twenty seven nation bloc while being propped up by i.m.f. money so for the next six months the e.u. and its systemic problems will be presided over by one of its weakest and most problematic members so what specific challenges does and face in europe over the six months of its presidency first the european economy is slowing flaws and the crisis is nowhere near over secondly it must preside over leaders actually agreeing to an e.u. budget for the years two thousand and fourteen to two thousand and twenty something they've spectacularly failed to do so far and thirdly there is a problem coming from right here in london increasing british opposition to brussels and the threat to european cohesion that uses the irish government expects the e.u. presidency to coast in excess of seventy million euros money the country can ill

afford and what will it be spent on twenty four million on catering accommodation and transport for example and another twenty million extra government starts. shooting a staunch spend half year in twenty twelve under house arrest and the other half holed up in the ecuadorian embassy in london but he still managed to produce a t.v. series talking t.v. kenya as shown by the mainstream media correspondent in london has been following his ups and downs. a lot of you say quickly it's ingenious i did more in a year or t. the most media organizations have done in decades we've really had a front seat view of everything that's been going on we had him at the beginning of the year of fighting extradition to sweden we saw his the pill rejected we then saw that dramatic twist in the trial when he went into the i could do it embassy seeking asylum we've been learning theory in the sciences certainly the british media we see a lot of the polls are quite viciously especially during the course of this year

with all these huge events happening surrounding julian assad a lot of people would put that down payment simply to jealousy. look at other news now in brazil nine hostages taken in a botched robbery have been found unharmed they were seized by an armed group who use explosives to rob it jewelry factory in the poor a town in the south of the country crowd celebrated be a nice move the hostages had been freed in the main square the man thought to be the head of the gang was also killed in a shootout with police so the united nations has imposed an arms embargo on twenty three rebels in the tent to quell fighting in the democratic republic of congo yarm group took control of the city of goma last month before being forced to withdraw under international pressure neighboring countries rwanda and uganda have been accused by the un of backing the rebels. after a short break i'll good office here to discuss the charm of french music with one

of its most famous and talented singers patricia kass who. invented by the famed soviet orthopedic because we will result in the nineteen fifties these frames were initially used to treat fractures in deformities by cutting bones and slowly pulling them up for a day or for stimulating tissue region. ration elizabeth was able to reshape arms and legs and people who thought they were crippled for life about a third of patients it was out of center now days seeking series three magic reasons most of them a man and most are not what you would call vertically challenged professor novikov who operated on many of them said it usually comes down to man's pride first patient return to us with a leg length in the quest to meet his fifteen centimeters to want to surgery

because it's panos to than him we like to say that we need to break their legs in order to fix their head like lengthening surgeries are banned in many countries and even when allowed their precious span safe in russia the entire course costs eleven thousand dollars about one tenth of the similar package in the united states financial considerations for one of the reasons that brought this washington state native to western siberia main motive for the surgery had to do with how he fared in the others. average is one seventy five i was one sixty seven or one sixty. eight centimeters with the average for women height is a pretty girl can be sure it's not a big deal i think it's like expected to be just before the operation most this matter a russian girl who found he's a regional hide quite in the.